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Chapter 4 focuses Paul Ricoeur’s work on religious hermeneutics. It does not treat all of Ricoeur’s extensive work and certainly does not argue that all of it is religiously motivated, as Ricoeur was always very careful to distinguish his philosophical from his religious projects. Yet the texts in which he is concerned with Scripture or an interpretation of religious experience do indeed make an argument for religious language as meaningful and true. The chapter explores his notion of religious truth as manifestation, as a source of meaning, and as an invitation to transformation. It also...

Chapter 4 focuses Paul Ricoeur’s work on religious hermeneutics. It does not treat all of Ricoeur’s extensive work and certainly does not argue that all of it is religiously motivated, as Ricoeur was always very careful to distinguish his philosophical from his religious projects. Yet the texts in which he is concerned with Scripture or an interpretation of religious experience do indeed make an argument for religious language as meaningful and true. The chapter explores his notion of religious truth as manifestation, as a source of meaning, and as an invitation to transformation. It also shows how his interpretation of religious texts leads him to define religious language as poetic, polyphonic, and excessive. The chapter hence suggests that even the more heavily phenomenological thinkers remain indebted to Ricoeur’s religious hermeneutics, especially in the way in which he defines the “truth” of religious experience.